What Stays in Vegas

Which is NOT where I went because I cannot afford to stay here:


Which is the most muy fabuloso hoteloso I've ever seen. And if I can't stay at the Wynn, I just walk on by. Besides, gamble with money? Surely you jest.

So, non.

I only LANDED in Vegas so that I could make the fifty bazillion hour trek through the most lonesome section of the Mojave desert known to man and a few coyotes to get to the good stuff in Utah. (Insert here: crickets chirping and a bunch of covered wagon-type women schlumping along behind their husbands going, "John? You dragged me away from my cushy Bostonian town home with the lawn and gardens and ladies luncheons and adorable outfits to pioneer this?") Look, I'm not making this up. Is this not the ne plus ultra of desolate, or what?


And you're talking to a gal who loves her some desert. But this is just wrong. This is mother nature and God pissed off at the same time.

There is some civilization. It's called Mesquite, Nevada, and it's located about twenty-five minutes northeast out of Vegas on the border with Arizona, and it's, like, God really, really on a bender, because imagine the photo above, only with a golf course, a Wal-Mart, twelve Taco Bell Mansion subdivisions, and a casino offering $39 massages and all you can eat King Crab legs – in the desert, Party People – for only $15.95 per person. Oh, and somewhere a few miles right before all this, someone had taken the trouble to hike out into the middle of the dusty scrub and decorate it with a big ol' "Ron Paul for President" sign.

Anyway. That was day one. I was not driving. I was looking out the window and thanking my lucky stars that I wasn't born a pioneer woman.

Okay, so then we get there and there's lots of hiking, climbing, running, jumping, boot camping. And eating. With high heels. And a couple glasses of Pinot Grigio. Well, okay, a lot of glasses of Pinot Grigio. Cause that's how I roll when I spa.

Then, the trip back. More crickets. More me thanking my lucky stars and wishing reading in the car didn't make me nauseated.

Then there is the fifty bazillion hours we sit in the Las Vegas airport. Any of you ever get stuck in this 9th circle of Dante's hell? Used to be, there was nothing to eat here except Cinnabons and $15.00 Wolfgang Puck wrap sandwiches. Now there is some place named something like The Tequilera or something, that serves up surly waiters nicknamed Gucci, $15.00 Cuervo 1800 margaritas, and the most gawd awful food known to mankind, only made fifty million times worse by the fact that there was no salsa to go along with it because of the tomato salmonella scare.

So not only did I end my trip hung over and with a grumbly tummy, I ended it famished.

It's good to be back home.

Lazy Ass Excuse for a Blog Post #3 Bazillion

Today, Party People, is the premier of yet another of what I like to call Moi's Exclusive Blob Features.

This one I am calling: The Post I Wish I'd Written But Didn't But it's Brilliantly Funny Nonetheless and You Should Go Read it NOW and Hence Save Moi From Having to Come up With Something of Her Own Today.

Written by Da Pirate, it's a deftly hilarious examination of what happens when an innocent engineer suddenly finds her utilitarian wardrobe poked and proded by a red alligator coat-wearing Russian fashionista.

GO READ IT NOW. You'll laugh yourself silly, which is a good thing for the weekend.

(P.S. Pirate: I love my distressed, olive green, tie bottom capris with the five bazillion pockets, too!)

I Knew It

You Belong in Milan

Stylish and sophisticated, you want to enjoy a truly European life - away from tourists! Milan fits you perfectly. Great shopping, high quality food, lots of culture... with very little hype.

What European City Do You Belong In?

I gotta go watch LSU kick some Ole Miss (Bob, why isn't it Ol'?) butt, pay homage to Fabulous 1970s Decor, weep over Elivs, and find me somewhere's a fried oyster po' boy sandwich. Or seven.

In the meantime, take the above Test: What Fern City Do You Belong In? and play amongst yourselves 'til I get back.

Ciao,
Moi

Lazy Ass Excuse for a Blog Post #2

While I firmly believe there is no crying in baseball, it seems that doesn't apply when it comes to NaNo. I don't know what's wrong with me this year. My brain is a hollowed out husk of its former self and my creativity has flipped me the bird. Last time I saw it, it was lounging on the sofa with a six pack of Fresca and a party-sized bag of Cheetos, zoning out in front of Fashion Television's coverage of the Spring 2008 Milan collections (yay! Luisa Beccaria – boo! Gucci Gucci Goo).

So, I will spend all weekend struggling to wrest my creativity out from the sticky-fingered clutches of crap television and trans-fat-soaked snacks. After all, my novel does feature sex and candy and cowboys. That ougtta be worth something.

In the meantime, Party People, let's take a moment to hunt down my creativity and take a gander at what, exactly, it would clothe itself in, given a $5 bazillion lottery win and just the right occasion:

If my creativity worked for a mega wattage corporate-type corporation and they were throwing a mega fabulous Christmas party and my dumb ass creativity had actually managed NOT to fall asleep at its desk one too many times from the stunning boredom of it all and hence didn't get itself barred from an invitation, my creativity would wear this:


And if my creativity's bestest friend in the whole wide world suddenly up and had a wedding, and I mean a REALLY REAL wedding, complete with cocktails and canapes and hot 20 year old waiters, instead of some drunken five minute ceremony at 2 a.m. in Vegas with Elvis in attendance, it would wear this:


And if my creativity were suddenly called upon to attend oh, I dunno, a posh Southern-Style event like the Kentucky Derby or maybe some second cousin of S.B.'s niece's coming out party, it would wear this:



And if I suddenly had to send my fat-ass creativity off to the grocery store for even more Fresca and Cheetos? I'd ask that it for Gawd's sake shed those stinkin' sweat pants and instead drape itself in this:



Finally, if my creativity absolutely refuses to get its fat ass off that sofa and into my office and behind my keyboard, I'm going to make sure, come hell or high water, it's going to spend the rest of its existence wearing this:


Pee yew, Party People. Gucci is just downright poochie this year.

Lazy Ass Excuse for a Blog Post

This is one of those what I like to call LAEFABP posts: In other words, I'm trying my durndest to keep my content fresh, but sometimes, hell, you know. I just don't have it in me to comment on the train wreck that is Britney Spears' life or Posh Spice's welded-on canteloup boob job or the fact that more children are killed each day by relatives than they are in a whole year by dogs.

Hence, what I like to call my Lazy Ass Excuse for a Blog Post, posts. In which I make instead half-hearted attempts to convince you that your life will be as devoid of light and meaning as a raging black hole if you don't watch, read, or listen to what I tell you.

Ergo:

DOWNLOAD THIS:
"This Wreckage" – Gary Numan










With his grinding moody Moogs and lost-in-psychic-space vocals deadpanning bargain basement existential clichés like And what if God’s dead/we must have done something wrong/This dark façade ends/We’re independent from someone, Numan was a grunge/goth/industrial guilty pleasure way before anyone else (you listening, Trent Reznor?).



READ THIS:
Geronimo: His Own Story: The Autobiography of a Great Patriot Warrior by Geronimo, S. M. Barrett, and Frederick W. Turner

When you're down and feeling blue, just ask yourself: What would Geronimo do?

Bad ass mother fucker (I just put that in here to see if the Censor Police would come after me, too.)








WATCH THIS:

If loving you is wrong, I don't want to feel right.